Empty factories to the east and all our waste
The shape of things that came show on the broken worker's face
To the west you'll find a silicon promised land
Where machines all replace their minds with systematic profit plans
The course of human progress staggers like a drunk
It's pace is quick and heavy but it's mind is slow and blunt
I look for optimism but i just dont know
Its seeds are planted in a poison place where nothing grows

It's 1989, stand up and take a look around
Weathers' bitter tension it seems is sinking down
Drunk with power and fighting one another
Every hour shows the winter's getting harder
There's a freeze up, there's a freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up--freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up, there's a freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up coming!

One nation stands the tallest radiating blinding light
Plastic and flourescent energy robbing us of sight
Set in our way - content with our decay
We wave the flag of freedom as we conquer and invade
Ever ask yourself where's my place in this hell?
But no one's there to tell you cuz they dont know that themselves
The well-rehearsed lines from our elated politicians
No longer offer solace we can see the self-destruction

It's 1989, stand up and take a look around
Weather's bitter tension it seems is sinking down
Drunk with power and fighting one another
Every hour shows the winter's getting harder

There's a freeze up, there's a freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up--freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up, there's a freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up coming!

Just one political song, just one political song
To drop into the list that stretches years and years long
Just one political song, just one political song
To drop into the list that stretches years and years long

Static and division is increasing like a storm
We are sheltered
We are forewarned
Nothing can be changed except ourselves
Nothing can be changed except ourselves!

There's a freeze up, there's a freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up, there's a freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up, there's a freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up--freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up, there's a freeze up coming!
There's a freeze up coming!

Operation Ivy, sometimes called "Op Ivy," (op Iv) was an American Ska punk band, from Berkeley, California formed in May 1987. The band was stylistically important as one of the first bands to mix the elements of hardcore punk and ska into a new amalgam called ska punk and was critical to the emergence of Lookout Records and the so-called "East Bay Sound."